Chapter Eleven
It happened so fast that C.J. didn’t have a chance to react. One moment she was standing at the curb, the next she was shoved aside and knocked to the ground with Boone McGraw crushing her with his body and the thick smell of engine exhaust wafting over them.
“Are you all right?”
She groaned as he rolled off her. The sound of the car engine died off in the distance. She became aware of people on the street huddled around them. “Did anyone get a plate number on that car?” she demanded as she tried to get to her feet.
Boone was on his. “Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked, sounding a little breathless as he hunkered down beside her.
She nodded, though her knee was scraped and her wrist was hurt, but wasn’t broken. She let him help her to her feet. She was more shaken than she’d thought when she was on the ground. One look at the people huddled around them and she could tell how close a call it had been. They were saying the same thing she was thinking. If it hadn’t been for the cowboy...
If it hadn’t been for Boone, it would have been another hit-and-run. Immediately, she thought of Hank. He hadn’t had anyone to throw him out of the way. Could it have been the same car?
“A license plate number,” she said to the small crowd around them again. “Anyone get it or a description of the car?” There was a general shaking of heads. Several said it had happened too fast.
“Kids,” one woman said. “They could have killed you.”
It hadn’t been kids. Her every instinct told her that. It was too much of a coincidence that Hank had been run down and now she had almost been killed by a speeding car, as well.
She finally looked at Boone. He appeared even more shaken than she was. She saw that he’d pulled out his phone. “What are you doing?” she asked as the crowd began to disperse.
“Calling the cops.”
“To tell them what? Did you see the car?” She saw that he hadn’t gotten a look at it, either, before he’d thrown them both out of the way. “Even if they took it seriously, we don’t have any information to give them. They’d just say it was another accident.”
He hesitated for a moment before he pocketed his phone. “You’re sure you’re all right?”
She nodded, although still trembling inside. In all the years she’d been around and in the private investigation business, that was the closest she’d come to being killed. She’d been scared a few times, especially when caught tailing a person in a fraud case. But this was something new.
Which was probably why Hank hadn’t seen it coming, either.
Boone opened the passenger side of his pickup and helped her in. She knew he was just being a gentleman because he felt guilty for still hanging around, but it made her feel weak and fragile—something she abhorred. She’d always had to be strong, for her mother. Now she had to be strong because otherwise she would fall apart. Hank was gone and she was terrified to find out why.
“You still think Hank’s death has nothing to do with Jesse Rose and the kidnapping?” he asked as he started the pickup.
She didn’t answer, couldn’t. Her heart was lodged in her throat. Someone had just tried to kill her and would have taken Boone with her as she realized how close a call that had been. Worse, after looking at what was on that flash drive, there was no doubt. Hank knew something about Jesse Rose—and possibly her kidnapping.
Last night, she hadn’t been able to sleep. She’d moved through her small house, restless and scared. At one point she thought she heard a noise outside. She’d never been afraid before living here. She’d always felt safe.
She’d checked all the doors and windows to make sure they were locked. But looking out into the darkness, she’d thought she’d seen the shape of a man in the trees beside the house. As she started to grab her purse and the gun inside, she saw that it was only shadows.
Her fears, she’d told herself, weren’t any she could lock out. Hank had known about Jesse Rose. So why hadn’t he told the McGraws?
Boone started the car. “Any other stops?”
She shook her head. “Let’s go to the city lot and get Hank’s car.” With luck, he would have left something in it for her, not that she held out much hope. Hank’s car always looked as if he was homeless and living in it. Finding a clue in it would literally be like looking for a needle in a haystack.
* * *
A FEW BLOCKS AWAY, Cecil pulled over to the side of the road. His hands were shaking so hard he had to lie over the wheel as he tried to catch his breath.
That had been so close. Just a few seconds later and he would have hit them both. Killed them both. He would have killed Boone McGraw. Killing some old PI was one thing. Even killing his young female partner. But if he had killed a McGraw...
The shaking got worse. He held on to the wheel as if the earth under him would throw him off if he didn’t. And yet a part of him felt such desperate disappointment. He had to end this. C.J. West wasn’t going to stop. He had to kill her. He had no choice.
When had things gotten so complicated? It had started out so simply and then he’d been forced to kill the PI. Now he would have to kill the PI’s partner. As long as he didn’t kill a McGraw. Travers McGraw would have every cop in the state looking for him if he did.
He began to settle down a little. He wouldn’t get another chance, not with a hit-and-run. She would be expecting it now—and so would Boone. No, he’d have to think of something else. He knew where she lived.
An idea began to gel. Kill her and he should be home free.
Wiping the sweat from his face with his sleeve, he pulled himself together. He was steadier now, feeling better. He could do this. He could make up for his past mistakes. His head ached. He felt confused. There wasn’t any other way out of this, was there?
He started to pull out, jumped at the sound of a loud car horn. A truck roared past, the driver flipping him the bird as he continued to lean on the horn.
Heart pounding, he checked his side mirror before slowly pulling out. He’d messed up, but he could fix it. He had no choice. But even as he thought it, he wondered how many more people he would have to kill to keep his secret. In for a penny, in for a pound, he thought.
* * *
BOONE DROVE TO the city yard and waited while C.J. went in to get Hank’s car released. He still hadn’t calmed down after their near miss back uptown. He would have loved to have passed it off as nothing but kids driving crazy fast and out of control—if C.J.’s partner hadn’t been killed in a hit-and-run.
He would also love to know what C.J. was thinking now. Was she ready to admit that all this had to be about the kidnapping? Was she finally all in? He still couldn’t be sure.
She came out shortly jingling a set of keys. Hank had left his keys in his car? What a trusting soul. It was a miracle the car hadn’t been stolen. Not that he ever worried about that in Whitehorse. But this was Butte. He shook his head as he got out and followed her to the blue-and-white Olds.
Unlocking it, she opened the driver’s-side door and stopped.
“What is it?” He glanced in expecting to see something awful. But the car looked spotless.
“His car never looks like this. Ever. He cleaned it out.” She sounded shocked. And worried.
“So he cleaned his car. Because he was planning to go somewhere in it.”
She looked skeptical. “Nowhere I can imagine that he would care.”
Boone was disappointed. He’d hoped that they would find something in the car. If the man had cleaned it out, something rare, then he doubted there would be anything to find. “You want me to drive it?”
She shook her head. “I’ll take it back to my place. You don’t mind following me?”
He’d been following her since he got to town. “Not a problem.”
She slid behind the wheel, but before she started the car, she reached up to touch what looked like a new small pine-scented car freshener hanging from the mirror. “This is so not Hank.”
Boone went back to his pickup and caught up to her as they headed back to her house. In the distance, he could see the skeletal headframe over one of the old mine shafts, the dark structure silhouetted against the skyline. Another reminder he was in mining country.
Parking, he joined her, looking under the seat to see if Hank had missed anything. The smell of pine was overpowering from the small tree-shaped car freshener hanging from the mirror.
“What do you think he was covering up? A dead body smell?” he asked, only half joking. C.J. hadn’t moved from the driver’s seat, her hands still on the big steering wheel.
“I don’t understand this change in him,” she said as if more to herself. “He bought a cell phone, he canceled the landline at his office and had the power turned off. He packed his best clothes and cleaned out his car. It was almost as if...”
“As if he was leaving for good?”
She slowly swung her head around to look at him. There were tears in her eyes. “I need to get ready for the funeral.”
“I’m going with you. Everyone knows that the killer always shows up at the funeral.”
C.J. looked as if she wanted to put up a fight but didn’t have it in her today after what had already happened.
“The problem is I didn’t bring funeral attire.”
She snorted. “This is Butte. I can promise you that most of the people there will be wearing street clothes because they’re street people.” She headed toward the house.
He waited until she went inside before he popped open the glove box. C.J. had already looked in it, but he’d noticed something that had caught his eye.
Like the rest of the car, it had been cleaned out, except for the book on the car. He pulled it out, noticing that it looked as if it had never been opened—except to stick two items into it. One was a boarding pass for a flight to Seattle. He looked at the date and saw that it was from last week—a few days before he was run down in the street.
The other was a train schedule. He flipped it over and recognized Hank’s handwriting from the McGraw file the man had started. Hank had written dates and times on the back of the schedule—from Seattle to Whitehorse, Montana.